Catlin's North American Indian Portfolio. Hunting scenes and amusements of the Rocky Mountains and prairies of America. From drawings and notes of the author, made during eight years' travel amongst forty-eight of the wildest and most remote tribes of savages in North America by CATLIN, George (1796-1872) - 1845

New York: James Ackerman, 304 Broadway, cor.[ner] Duane St, 1845. Folio. (21 3/4 x 15 3/8 inches). Letterpress title (verso blank), 1p. "To the American Public" (verso blank), pp.[5-]16 explanatory text. 25 hand-coloured lithographic plates after Catlin. Expertly bound to style in half red morocco and publisher's cloth boards with morocco label. Housed in a red morocco backed box Provenance: Edward Eberstadt (catalogue 127:113, pencil note on front endpaper); Frank T. Siebert (his sale, Sotheby's New York, 28 October 1999, lot 845) The very rare first American edition of Catlin's masterpiece: among the most rare and desirable of all American color plate books or western Americanum. This is only the eleventh known copy of the coloured issue of the American edition of the North American Indian Portfolio, according to William Reese's census of over 160 sets, and corresponds to Reese issue 6. Bennett states: "This book is of the most excessive rarity and worth several times the value of the more common British printing." A highly important record of a "truly lofty and noble race...A numerous nation of human beings...three-fourths of whose country has fallen into the possession of civilized man...twelve million of whose bodies have fattened the soil in the mean time; who have fallen victims to whiskey, the small-pox, and the bayonet" (Catlin). Catlin first published his North American Indian Portfolio. .. in two issues in London in late November 1844. The first issue was hand-colored, the second had tinted plates. Both the London editions are now very rare, but they are known in roughly tenfold the number of this incredibly rare American edition, evidently published without Catlin's knowledge or consent in New York in 1845. It is a milestone in lithography in the United States. It was issued in a hand-colored edition on paper, in a hand-colored edition on card, and in a tinted edition on paper. Of the 160 copies of Catlin's work located in a census by William Reese, only sixteen were the American edition. Of the sixteen other located copies, half have the plates colored and printed on paper, as in the present copy. Only three American editions have appeared at auction since the late 1970s, while the London edition appears with some regularity. On a leaf after the titlepage, the publisher, Ackerman, proudly states that he is happy to prove that American work can be the equal of anything produced in Europe; his preface is given in full below. Catlin's North American Indian Portfolio contains the results of his years of painting, living with and travelling amongst the Great Plains Indians. Catlin summarized the American Indians as "an honest, hospitable, faithful, brave, warlike, cruel, revengeful, relentless, - yet honourable, contemplative and religious being." In a famous passage from the preface to the London edition of his North American Indian Portfolio. ., Catlin describes how the sight of several tribal chiefs in Philadelphia led to his resolution to record their way of life: "the history and customs of such a people, preserved by pictorial illustrations, are themes worthy of the lifetime of one man, and nothing short of the loss of my life shall prevent me from visiting their country and becoming their historian." He saw no future for either their way of life or their very existence, and with these thoughts always at the back of his mind he worked, against time, setting himself a truly punishing schedule, to record what he saw. From 1832 to 1837 he spent the summer months sketching the tribes and then finished his pictures in oils during the winter. The record he left is unique, both in its breadth and also in the sympathetic understanding that his images constantly demonstrate. A selection of the greatest of images from this record were published in Catlin's North American Indian Portfolio in an effort to reach as wide an audience as possible. In addition to publishing the present work, Catlin also spent from 1837 to 1852 touring the United States, England, France and Holland with his collection of paintings, examples of Indian crafts and accompanied by representative members of the Indian tribes. A financial reverse in 1852 meant that he lost the collection, but he spent his later years making several trips to South and Central America, sketching the natives there. Ackerman's introduction to this New York edition reads, in full: "To the American Public. A young American artist ventures to challenge for his works that encouragement which has hitherto been ministered too sparingly to American productions. As nation, we have so long been reproached with inability to produce pictorial embellishments equal to the European that, although a mistaken, it has become a received opinion. The enthusiastic author of the London Edition of this splendid and talented work has practically succumbed to the prevailing yet unjust prejudice, and has carried the results of his daring genius and enterprise to a foreign mart; sending from abroad, and from the hands of European artists, an American production in foreign habiliments to be patronized in the author's own land. The Artist and publisher of the republication on this side of the water, evincing through this, his enterprise, of American Art, an abiding confidence in the taste, judgement and liberality of his countrymen, has ventured (with a mere change of dress), to offer a cheaper, and he trusts, a better edition than the costly London copy. Fully equal, or greatly superior, the critical justice of the country may decide it to be. Of this favorable result, hope may tell the Artist a "flattering tale", yet he would plead enthusiasm, without which the life and spirit of all art dies. At all events, the greater cheapness of this edition is as unquestionable, a that it is purely "American fabric" recommends its patronage. In fact, the Artist would contest the received opinion, that nothing pictorial can be executed in this country equal to the European productions, and would leave his countrymen to carry out the experiment, whether it be not that patronage is alone wanting to produce originals- or republications equal if not superior to those of all Europe. This venture, receiving no impulse from the powerful arm of an overflowing government treasury, starts on an "Exploring Expedition" of its own, into the waters of criticism; and, if but prosperous gales attend its return, the grateful Artist pledges his unwearied efforts to produce nothing but the best specimens of American delineative art, wherewith to acknowledge the patronage and indulgence of his countrymen and to vindicate the capacity of our native artists." Bennett, p.22; Howes C243; McGrath, pp.52-53; Reese, Issue 6; Siebert Sale 845 (this copy); Reese, Stamped with a National Character 25; Wagner-Camp 105A:3.